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Mew Jfforft an^ Xonbon 

(^, p. Putnam's Sons 

1895 



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Copyright, i8q5 

BY 

G P. PUTNAM^S SONS 



XTbe Iknicf^ecbocket ipreBs, 'Dew l^orfc 



»' 



MARY 



One Hundred Copies Printed. 
Type Distributed. 



For an Angel of Death there is, 
A terrible Angel of Death, 

Who gathers the souls that die 
In the bodies that still draw breath. 



CONTENTS 








Mary i 


Love Grew .... 






29 


Deus 






33 


Out of the Land of Sleep 






34 


Hoping 






35 


Learned .... 






37 


From Dark to Dark . 






38 


An Eagle .... 






40 


Two Sides .... 






42 


Groping .... 






45 


Waiting .... 






46 


En Avant 




47 


A Playbill . . 






48 



MARY 



MARY 



I. 

Jerusalem ; outside the Hall of Justice. Group 
of people in discussion slowly breaking up. 
Sound of a horse approaching at a gallop. 
A man covered with dust enters^ searching 
anxiously among the crowd. He stops before 
one who sits leaning against a statue^ and lays 
his hand on his shoulder. 

First 
Awake ! 



Second 
Springing to his feet 

What cursed fool is this ! You here ! 

First 
Hast seen her ? 

Second 
It is over. 

First 

Over ? — How ? 
What? Quick ! I 'm but just come. 

Second 

From Joppa? 

4 



First 
Yes. How over? 

Second 

She 's condemned. 

First 

Condemned ? Condemned ? My God ! The 
tale 's true then ! 

Second 

True as the judgment 's just. I saw her face 
As she swept by us in the Hall. By God 
A queen 

First 

How looked she ? Did she bend 
Before the storm ? Was she all white — afraid ? 



Second 

Not that — I think. White — yes, white ; 

But there was firmness in her step, she might 

have been 
An emperor's concubine. Not as she was, a 

First 

Stop! 

Second 

Laughing 

Ah, well, you knew her, {mockingly^ and you 
know they say 

First 
Impatiently 

The prison ? 



Second 
Looking at him curiously 

Heads of Caesar have their weight. 
Don't be a fool, I warn you. She *s not worth it. 



11. 

A prison in Jerusalem, A woman by a grated 
window overlooking a portion of the city. 
Sounds of singing and laughter from a neigh- 
boring house. 

She 
Listening 

I know them. I could name them one by one. 

(A young man enters) 
And so you come at last ! I looked for you, 
Even in the Court. Half hoped you might be 

there ; 
But yet, I might have known 



He 

You surely knew 
My leaving. Down in Joppa word creeps slow. 
God knows I hastened. All has come so fast, 
I scarce had time to mount and rush away, 
When the burnt Arab devil laughed the news. 
I never stayed to smite him on the mouth. 
Fearing to be made certain 

She 

You have heard ? 

He 

All. All. No doubt, full balancing of lies, 
Were the tale thinned. What matter though, 

the fact 
Is that he 's dead, and you 



She 

I killed the fool 
In a mad moment. I was drunk. The wine 
Hot, swelled my hatred of him as the sun 
Swells rotten bodies on the desert sands. 
Even now — but what of it. You come to me, 
You, who have loved me so — you, who forgave 
All to me — all. And now ! — and now ! — Too 
late! 

He 
It is the same. 

She 
Too late. . . . The Roman? 

He 

No. 

lO 



She 

So much the better. It is ended then. 
Why did you come to me ? 

He 

I scarcely know. 
Perhaps I hoped some mercy in the man. 
We helped him once. But e*er I came 't was 
done. 

She 

After a pause ^ aside 

He sits there with bent head nor speaks nor 

moves. 
The only one of all to come to me. 
'T is something. 

(She goes to him and gently takes his hand) 

II 



Ah, your hands are burning hot ! 
Poor boy. (Returns to grating) The moon 

makes all things clear as day. 
(To him) Dost hear the singing? Hark! 

Hark now ! 

He 
Motionless 
I hear. 

She 

I should be there to lead them on. Think you 
They miss me? . . . Answer, boy. Why, hours 

ago 
I was their leader. Think you all so soon 
They have forgotten me ? 

He 

I do not know. 

12 



A loudf startling burst of laughter^ in which she 
suddenly joins recklessly and wildly^ holding by 
the bars. He shudders, and, rising, goes softly 
across and puts his arms about her. She starts 
and faces him. Their eyes meet. 
Peace, dear. 

She 
Aside 
This boy's love *s wonderful. 
So great a love might have saved even me. 
( To him suddenly) To-night *s the last. Shall 

it be one of love ? 
Look — I am yours. You shall remember me. 
Shall say that ^* of all women I have known 
Was not one like her.** In your wife's own 

arms 
When you shall have her, shall come thought 
of me. 

13 



(Throws her mantle aside and seats herself 

beside him) 
See, I am yours ! 

He 

Rising suddenly and pacing up and down 

Not that ! Not that ! Ah, dear, 
This night will end, and you will leave me. 

Dear, 
Leave me some precious memory. Oh, my 

soul. 
The past falls from you as a filthy robe — 
I see you only as you are. Oh, God ! 
I fled away by night to reach the Roman. 



She 

Mercy from him ! Why, I was his 

14 



He 

Hush, dear, 
Wrap this about you. I had hoped — but no. 
He feared some trick. Beside me — here, be- 
side me. 

She 

At your feet — so ? 

He 

Beside me, dearest — here. 
Talk to me. Tell me something of yourself — 

your past. 
Oh God ! — tell me of anything but now. 

She 

About the past ? — my past ? T is like one day 
All overcast and dark and deep in storm 

15 



With white-hot, zig-zag flashes lighting it. 
Ah, dear, my wretched, burning life lies drunk — 
Drunk *mid the debris of a hundred bowls 
Filled and a-quiver, once with laughing love — 
Drained at a draught. 

He 
Nay, love — not that — not that. 

She 

To the beginning ? That was years ago. 
Nay, not so many. Hot, mad, crawling years. 
God ! It was he ! That face ! I could not 

help it. 
Why, I can feel the night — you think me mad ! 
You think to-morrow touches me ? Poor boy ! 

fA pause. Suddenly to him) 
Think of a little garden by a pool, 

i6 



Where the moon slept, and distant river things 

Sent flying ripples breaking in the ooze. 

A dark, cool night after a day of fire. 

Far off a wolf breaks out, and near at hand, 

Reeds shiver when some swift form pressed 

their roots. 
You Jews know nothing of that India 
Where I was born. You waste your lives to 

build 
Some sure wealth — some safe refuge for your- 
selves. 
Owners of things — not knowing ye are owned. 

My father was blind Nasha, and a prince. 
You look in wonder ? I have seen great kings 
Waiting his pleasure. He was called the Sage ; 
Men came from far to speak with him, and all 
He answered in the tongue their lips knew best. 

2 

17 



Nasha — Blind Nasha — of all on this earth 
He loved me deepest — me the tiny thing 
Whose lips the nurse raised to him to be kissed 
Each morn — my earliest memory was this, 
And nurse's round-eyed awe at sight of him. 
Oh, the long hours, and days, and months, and 

years, 
That slid away, as soft sand from the feet, 
While in my garden by the rippling pool, 
I listened to my nurse's droning songs. 
And made her tell me tales of distant lands, 
And of my father ! 

One I loved to hear 
About him. How years gone, e'er I was born — 
Swift years had slipped away and I had grown 
Into a tall maid, lythe and slumbrous eyed — 
How he had gone into a distant land 

i8 



Far to the West, and with him other two, 
Seeking some mystery — something then to come. 
I knew all afterwards. But then I knew 
Only the mystery of love that grew 
Into a heat that made my heart so dry 
That, at the spark, \ was tinder for the blaze 
That rose, as rushes up a forest fire. 

And then he came ! My father had grown old 
And weak, and now of days he often came, 
With slower steps into my little space. 
Sitting beside me silently. His eyes — 
Those dear blind eyes I loved to press and kiss — 
Fixed on the pool as though he still could seek 
From the dark depth some hidden mystery. 

And then he came ! 'T was on a burning 
night 

19 



Just ending. Dawn came creeping through 

the mist, 
And, all along, the Eastern sky ran fire, 
And sent out steaming, smoky, lurid clouds ; 
And afterwards an oval reeking sun 
Staggered, a hot-faced drunkard in the sky. 
Sleepily crawling from a night of lust. 

I still can paint my father on that day. 
I can recall his sudden, startled glance, 
The bent brows — the quick flash of sightless 

eyes. 
At the soft words. I scarce could see the face. 
Oh God ! — that face ! A slight youth — noth- 
ing more, 
Outlined against the red sky of the dawn. 
His head thrown back against the bloody sun, 
Hiding the features — a mere fragile boy 
Who whispered softly : '' Master, I have come.'" 



Alas ! Our hearts are but worn beds, where 

love 
Shall trickle first, then murmur, then fling down 
His torrent charged with fragments of wrecked 

souls. 
We know not when the course is first begun. 
Until, long after, memory recalls 
A drop's swift glisten at the set of sun, 
And a faint, distant murmur scarcely heard 
Amid the forest sounds of health and life. 
So I knew not that aught was changed — that 

life 
Ran not the same sweet course it ran before. 
Or was it tasteless it had been, for now 
The very air was burdened with new sense. 

Then I was married, and a year fled by. 
I left my father. It was all so new 

21 



And strange, and full of unexpected things 
That, at the first, I scarcely missed his hand. 
The kiss, the cool night's unexplained desires,. 
All things were swallowed in the new strange 

sense 
Of womanhood — of passion, the intense 
New yearnings deep within me satisfied. 

They told me that the youth whom I had seen 
Had staid beside my father many months. 
Talking and learning truth of him, for he. 
They said, was wisest of all wise of men, 
And highest. He, they said, had taught the 

youth 
Strange mysteries of life and thought and 

truth ; 
Re-incarnation and its wondrous strides 
Across the past ; the mystery of death, 

22 



And that supremest, so they said, of all : 

The mighty secret of the body's rise 

After cold Death had placed his silent hand. 

I listened to it all, but only smiled. 

Remembering the red sun at his back, 

And the long throbbing night before he came. 

Now whether *t was the fatal thing in me. 
Working its way, or whether my good star 
That led me, I know not, but one sweet day, 
When birds and trees and flowers were part 

of me, 
I begged to be let wander once again 
By the dear pool, and pass a score of days 
In the old places. I was not yet strong 
From my child's birth, and it was granted me. 

I came as one comes to a sacred place 
Where, yet, the sense of loving worship gives 

23 



Pure freedom. Every flower and tree and reed 
Bent swift acknowledgment of my return. 
And little startled living things crept out 
And peered a welcome at me ere they fled. 

I turned and he was there. My soul fled back, 
The throbbing fortress tottered traitorously. 
A soft mist flew before my eyes, and his 
Looked on me as upon transparency. 

I know not now the story of that day. 

Or of the days that filled each hour of it. 

Love burst upon me as a giant wind 

That swept back breath and filled me with itself, 

Burning me, freeing me, teaching me anew 

True meaning in the most minute of things. 

Three days from that I came to him at night. 
And crept beside him when he lay asleep. 

24 



His warm breath touched my cheek, I caught 

his arm 
About me — all my being surged to him, 
Seeking to bear expression of the pain 
My soul was suffering, by the single way 
That men had taught me. 

Then he half arose ; 
The starlight shone upon his face. I drew 
Back fearful. Yet I loved him. God ! I loved 
As woman never loved a man on earth. 
And in those few short moments while he spoke 
The words of mercy, that yet drove me on 
Into the living death, I loved him so 
My very soul ached with the pain of it. 
God knows I was not mad ! God made such 
love ! 

She rises and goes to the grating. He 

25 



follows^ and they stand looking out together. 
Dawn is breaking in the East, 

He 
The dawn is breaking. 

She 
Yes .... It IS the last* 

He 
Repeating abstractedly 

The last ! . . . And is there yet no more to 
tell? 

She 

Yes. There is more. Some you yourself can 

fill, 
Some others. I was soon beyond all trace, 

26 



And none had wish to follow. I was free 
To work my will. I threw myself on vice 
As starving dogs fall upon rotten flesh, 
I knew not there was stench ; I hungered so 
For something that might bear the shape of 
love. 



Passion from passion grew, and lust from lust^ 
Till all things took one way and I was dead, 
Long ere the Roman judged me for a crime, 
Itself but one more step in the long stair 
Down which I had been rushing leap by leap. 
(She leans silently against the grating for 
a while) 



I drifted to Jerusalem. Here I found 
Romans and natives ready with their gold 

27 



To tempt, they thought ! Tempt me who 

sought out sin 
For its own sake ! And here once more we 

met. 

Nay, *t was the last. I never strove again 
To tempt him. He was even stronger now 
Than when I saw him last. His eyes shone clear 
Command of self. The body fell from him— 
It almost seemed a soul that moved and spoke. 

And yet he had forgiven me, and said 

A word of consolation unto me 

Before them all, speaking with tenderness 

Of s/te that hath loved much, and her forgive- 

nesSy 
And yet one fatal day, at Golgotha, 
They crucified him with two common thieves. 

28 



LOVE GREW 

1000 B.C. 

Mutter of kingdoms that fell ; 

Whisper of down-beaten creeds ; 
Dread of, and laughter at hell ; 

Sobs of an earth that bleeds ; 
Chaos, and man its destroyer, 

Gasping last throes of the Fight ; 
Dull morning light in crushed nations ; 

Ages with eyes toward the light. 

And Love — tJie piuiy thing — 
Lay with upturned eyes, 
Unseen the blue of the skies ^ 

Unheeded the sou7ids that iving. 



29 



A.D. 

Morning that slowly unfolds; 

Creatures of strained eyes that stare 
Dazed onto space, that holds 

Light — new soul of the air ; 
Sodden feet's hesitation ; 

Sighs and heart anguish out-hurled ; 
Sudden far voices of birds that twitter 

Over a blood-stained world. 

And ONE looked on Love and smiled; 

He took the tiny hand^ 

And the meaning of crosses that stand 
Reads only : Behold the Child ! 



30 



1000 A.D. 

Onward with surging tread, 

Myriad millions creep ; 
On to the broad light spread. 

Lo ! from the Dark's still Deep, 
Hands and a Mighty Few, 

Walling with turret and tower, 
Binding it — hiding anew. 

And dull bells clang of God's power. 

Deeper the eyes of youths 
Hotter the temples burn ; 
Church — the hag at the loom — 

Gilt-spangles the garment of Truth. 



31 



A.D. 2000. 

Sudden with lifted head, 

Gazing on day unscreened, 
Hands that were torn and bled 

Staining where walls intervened* 
Standing 'mid wreck of the Past — 

Rotten bastion and wall — 
Glorious Single-Soul hears at last 

Rattle of chains that fall. 

Struggling, gasping, ablaze, 

The white flesh burning the woof 
Love — Love that is Truth — 

Flashes to men from the haze. 



32 



DEUS 

Blind God doth creep and creep, 

Who, in the moving sea of human hearts, 

Might find a dim distorted image of himself. 

His deafened ears hear not ; 

His nostrils breathe not of the fumes that rise 

Up out of torn, crushed things. 

His lips taste not 

The dew of heavy prayers — they brush unfelt, 

Yet, touching, leave a damp upon his brow. 

He is but God, 

Dumb, chained, immortal, hopeless, hoping God. 

3 



33 



OUT OF THE LAND OF SLEEP 

Out of the land of sleep there came 

A memory of Pain ; 
Out of the land of Life's broad wealth, 

Came Pain himself ; 
Out of the land of Is-to-be, 

Floateth a voice to me, 
And the voice doth whisper again, again : 

Pain — ever Pain. 



34 



HOPING 

All filled with soft gray mist — not yet the 

day 
Comes with its sea of brightness that will fling 
The dark from interlacing boughs that cling, 
Like fretwork, on the crystal river way. 
And all my windows filled with Autumn play ; 
With leaves like little hopes that toss and 

spring. 
Stiff, trembling, hoping still, yet soon to 

swing. 
Numb 'neath the mantle of the Winter's sway. 

Nor yet the day within, where one poor leaf 
Clung drooping, but has fluttered and is gone ; 

35 



One stray among the myriad million such. 
Yet I, who watched its deepening tone of 

grief, 
And hunger for the soft sun once that shone, 
Have drawn from Death strange knowledge of 

his touch. 



36 



LEARNED 

I HAVE crept up to see — 

Hold back the curtain there, 
Let me pass free. 

I have passed in to know 

Meanings, whose broken sense 
Floated up long ago. 

Outside the folds I lie. 

God, there is silence here ! 
I have crept back to die. 



37 



FROM DARK TO DARK 

Out there, 'mid wind-blown heaps of sand, 
And throb of burning suns overhead, 

At foot of crags, a Silent Land 
Lies in a valley, still and dead. 

A Silent Land that slopes away 

To dim horizons and the dark. 
Where moaning winds their mist-shrouds sway 

0*er blackened figures drawn and stark. 

Yet ever up the steep incline. 

From far, appearing one by one. 
With staggering step, from time to time, 

Come tottering figures in the sun. 

33 



Before, the black gigantic walls 

With polished surface gleam and burn ; 

The sand's hot surge behind them crawls, 
And buries those who turn. 

Step after step in silent march ; 

In silence form by form sinks low — 
No cloud in that unbroken arch, 

In that eternal glow. 



39 



AN EAGLE 

O'er the land of piled-up cloud hills 

Doth thy shadow run, 
Floating mute in gloomy grandeur 

Toward the setting sun. 

Never song of lark or linnet 

Unto thee may fly, 
As thy pinions snatch the sunlight 

From the flowers that lie. 

Trees arose for simpler singers, 
Shade for shyness grew ; 

Song fell unto them for solace, 
Silent strength to you. 

40 



Thou who readest music written 
On the storm's white bars ; 

Hearest throbs of death-loosed spirits 
Flashing to the stars, 

Hast not felt across thy bosom, 

With the sun-clad airs, 
Warmer passion-breaths arisen — 

Whispered love and prayers ? 

Thou disdainer of the shadows. 

Lingering dim and late, 
Canst thou gather from the heavens 

Naught but strength and hate ? 



41 



TWO SIDES 

{Without :) 

Low, broken ceiling ; dark ; the day slow dying ; 

The woman peering on the still white face, 

Silent lying ; 

Drawing the cover to its place. 

With hand of one not moved of heart to pity — 

Here, in the city. 

No, not all yet is over — not all yet. 

See, a slow breath moveth ! On the cheek 

Something gleams wet. 

Some word still to speak ? 

Nay, nay, what could he say ! Waste not your 

pity- 
Here, in the city. 

42 



{Within:) 

Sunset. The glorious interlacing light ; 
The drifting boat ; the oars that no more grip 
The golden water — all the senses slip 
With warmth and color from the crooning 
night. 

No ! From the night ! She came up from the 

dark 
Into the desert soul. Could he but read aright. 
There in the dark, her eyes would still bear 

light- 
There in the dark. 

Peace, and the eyes are gleaming over there ; 
Shall they not bear the glory of the throne 
Into the depths — the souFs — God's very own ? 
Now heart to heart across heavy air. 

43 



{Without:) 

The tread of heavy feet ; few words to make 

The silence drearier; forms that halt and 

strain, 
And slowly take 
Their way back to the air from whence they 

came. 
They follow but their trade. Put by your 

pity- 
Here in the city. 



44 



GROPING 

Under the far flung stars ; 

'Mid kelp and the wading grass, 
And the flickering flashing bars 

Of the lights that pass ; 

Something that floats with the tide ; 

I saw it creep by night, 
Then back o*er the shingles slide. 

E'er the coming light ; 

Something that hath a plan. 
Dim, and devised in the deep, 

Clutching with fingers wan, 
The grasses that sleep. 



45 



WAITING 

What though I care not that the night skies 
sob 

Their stars to earth — 

The end will come. 

Or that morn's heaven is all hot with God 
And new light's birth — 

The end will come. 

What though blind beggar souls pass asking 
aid, 

I turn away — 

The end will come. 

Or that she feel not now my warm tears fall 
Upon this clay — 

The end will come. 

46 



EN AVANT 

Again and again and again 

Thou shalt come ; 
The myriad lives of men, 

In thy turn shalt run. 
*Till a window, the crystal souls of all men 

In the walls of matter shall be, 
And dumb, cold God, from the caverns of Death, 

Shall look forth and see. 



47 



A PLAYBILL 

" This Nighty in the Theatre of the Hearty 
A Play for All— Come all Who Wilir 
The light dies down ; now, with a start, 

Flares up ; my searching eyes fixed[[still 
Catch, in the glow, 
New words below. 
The broad red capitals unroll 
The name : " The Body and the Soul.'' 



48 



God thought, and the thought was Man, 
And Form gleamed out of strife , 

And as ceons of ages ran, 

God dreamed, and the dream was Life. 



49 



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